My first GeoWoodstock was in Warren, Pa., in 2011.
What an experience it was. I had known about GeoWoodstock since I started geocaching, but I had never been because it had been in places not too close to me.
So with it being in western Pennsylvania, I knew I had to go to it.
Several years passed and it was coming back closer to the Northeast in Boonsboro, Maryland. I made reservations early and waited. When pre-registration opened, I signed up and ordered the items I wanted. Then I waited some more.
This year’s GeoWoodstock was an amazing event!
Memorial Day weekend was the culmination of that wait.
One thing I found out and realized with this one is how into it the whole community seemed to be. Businesses welcomed people with no issues. People seemed to know about and embrace the thousands of people coming into the area for this event.
That’s a positive thing.
More than that, the committee behind this GeoWoodstock was stellar.
From the early arrival event on Friday to the main event on Saturday, things ran smooth. There were so many solid vendors. The food offerings were really good. I didn’t see many seminars, but the ones I peeked in on seemed to be solid and well-done. There were also a bunch of people at each one.
The weather didn’t hurt, either.
With sunny skies, it was a fine weekend to be outside. People chatted and swapped stories. Pathtag trading was being done all over. For my little group, we spent some time at the event, went and cached some, then came back for the end of the event. We then cached more before coming back for the Midnight Madness event (more on that in a future post).
This truly was one of the best geocaching experiences I’ve ever had.
The whole weekend was awesome. There were many satellite events, loads of geocaches to be found, and friendly people everywhere you went.
I also loved the amount of vendors and, as noted earlier, they were all solid. There were different geocaching items for sale, which was nice to see.
This event also got me back into the geocaching mood. From December to about early April, I kind of wasn’t into it. Part of it was the weather, but another part was I was a little stale with things. I needed a small break. A weekend like this was perfect because I got to remember all the good things about geocaching.
It also made me realize I want to start making plans for the next one, which is during July 4 weekend next year just outside of Denver. I’ve never been to Colorado, so this seems like a good reason. The cool part is two of us got talking about it and are thinking about making it a road trip – driving out and back – to get a bunch of states and great caches. So we’ll see how it goes. It doesn’t hurt to plan. The worst-case scenario is I don’t go and have to cancel any reservations I make. In a perfect world, I’ll make this a yearly trip.
It was a fantastic time though and if you are a geocacher and have never been to GeoWoodstock, I’d highly encourage you to attend one at some point!
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I too had a fantastic time, hope you do a piece on the WVTim caches, only found 13 of them but everyone was a amazing!
Check back a couple of days… one already ran!
Never been to a GeoWoodstock. I enjoy small gatherings, but have never gone to a Mega-Event such as this one.
That, and the only one that was close enough to me was the one up in Sacramento that didn’t coincide very well with when I could go etc. I suppose that might change once I retire. Then I’ll be able to go to some of those off season events. That’s one of the reasons I can’t go to the Block Party. I’m back at work already for that one. Sigh.
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I like the small gatherings, too, but at the same time, the big ones can be fun. It depends on the mega you go to. I like the ones where you can stay for a few hours and not get bored. Many megas I have been to are ones where you show up, sign the log, talk for a few and then go caching. Those don’t define “mega” to me because they have 500 people sign a log. I like the ones where people are there, mingle, and have some fun.
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